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We Kettled the BNP! On Saturday 15th August a very mixed coach load of Cambridge people met up early in the morning to go to protest at the British National Party's 'Red White and Blue' Festival in the Derbyshire village of Codnor. We did this because we know that, behind the façade of a 'family friendly' festival, the BNP want to use this event both to recruit new members and to harden up existing ones into fully fledged Nazis. That is why speakers included leaders of neo Nazi groups from across Europe, such as Jean-Marie Le Pen, Italian Fascist Roberto Fiore and Swedish Nazi Marc Abramsson who has advocated 'racially pure kindergartens', and also American white supremacist Preston Wigington. This also explains why locals have complained of hearing Nazi marching songs and chants of Heil Hitler coming from inside the camp – no wonder reporters were not allowed in unsupervised!
Given the role of the festival in fermenting racial hatred, Unite
Against Fascism were eager to do what we could to undermine it –
when the right to free speech is used to promote a system that would
ultimately destroy it, along with the lives of millions of people,
we believe that that right is forfeited . Thus we assembled with thousands
of others across the country, and armed only with our bodies, our
ideas and our commitment, and were able to blockade the festival for
most of the day, preventing many Nazis and their guest speakers from
getting in. After that we had a joyous, exuberant and triumphant march
into Codnor market place, where we received a welcome from many of
the locals.
We hope that the success of our protest will be a major setback in the growth of the poisonous politics of the BNP, and that last month's Euro elections will mark the high tide mark of their support. Cambridge Unite Against Fascism and Love Music Hate Racism certainly mean to continue to be active in our city to ensure that we drive down their vote of 2.27% and to ensure that the horrors of the Holocaust happen never again!
As we sung in Codnor "We are black, white, Asian and we're Jew / And there are many, many more of us than you." Cambridge UAF / Love Music Hate Racism www.cambsagainstthenazis.co.uk |
